Betz, Martin & Sullivan lead Owls, 9-3

Gabelsville's monumental 6th-inning surges leave them one 'hoot' away from a 3-peat.

By Steve Smull

    LIMEPORT -- The Owls sent 15 batters to the plate in the 6th inning Wednesday night to turn a nip-and-tuck, barn-burner of a contest into a walk in the park over the final 1 1/2 innings as Gabelsville rallied for a 9-3 win and a 2-0 series lead in the best-of-5 championship series.

    If the Gabelsville Owls do not have a lucky number, then they now have one by default.

    6.

    As in the 6th inning.

    In their last three playoff games, the Owls trailed by a run going into the 6th inning. And in all three of those games, the Owls had a fairly safe lead by the time the seventh inning rolled around.

    On July 31, Boyertown led Gabelsville 2-1 after 5 innings.

    The Owls led 6-2 entering the 7th.

    On August 3, Limeport led Gabelsville 3-2 after 5 innings.

    The Owls led 6-3 entering the 7th.

    And finally, on Wednesday night, Limeport led Gabelsville 1-0 after 5 innings.

    The Owls led 9-1 entering the 7th.

    Gabelsville has outscored their opponents 18-0 in the sixth inning of their last three playoff contests. While they have been outscored 8-3 in every other inning of those games.

    That 18-0 advantage in the sixth inning of their last three games is monumental. Maybe even magical. Is there a Gabelsville fan conjuring up secret spells somewhere off Route 100 during these games?

    "I think it is simply coincidence," said Gabelsville manager Matt Danner, not giving in to any hocus-pocus theories. "In those three games, we had plenty of chances to score runs. We just didn't cash in on many of them. You can say some of that was bad luck, but tonight [Limeport] made some great plays to keep us off the board. But with all the chances we were getting, you just had to figure that eventually something was going to break for us."

    And that "something" was the 9-run sixth inning that resembled a jailbreak for the Owls.

    Despite the 9-3 final, the first five innings were extremely tense.

    Limeport wasted no time getting on the scoreboard Wednesday night. Mike Cudwadie singled to start the inning and then advanced to second on a Dan Hemberger sacrifice bunt. However, the throw skipped away at first, so Hemberger was safe and Cudwadie made it to third. After a strikeout with Hemberger stealing second on the third strike, Brian Ernst hit behind the runners to score Cudwadie on the 4-3 ground-out and it was 1-0 Bulls.

    Meanwhile, Bulls' pitcher Ryan Palos was dodging bullets. However, some of those bullets were shot at him by his own defense. Although for every defensive miscue, there was a good defensive play by Limeport to cancel out the bad ones.

    And the top of the third was an example of a great defensive play cancelling out two bad ones.

    Josh Martin got a one-out single down the left-field line and advance to second on an infield error. After a mental error on defense was scored a fielder's choice to load the bases with one out for the Owls, Shawn Betz came to the plate and hit a fly-ball to right that certainly seemed deep enough to score the lead-off batter Martin from third.

    But Bulls' right-fielder Devon Ziegenfuss had other ideas.

    Ziegenfuss made the catch and launched a missile from right-field that had a chance to get to the plate a whisker ahead of Martin, who tagged from third, but the throw was going to be tough hop for catcher Ben Swatsky to handle. Yet Swatsky snagged the tough hop and in one motion tug Martin just before he touched home for the third out to complete a "web gem" that would make the top three on any given night on ESPN.

    So Palos was dodging the bullets while the Bulls' offense made a pair of base-running mistakes that may have cost them two runs, but yet Limeport still led 1-0 after five innings.

    Then came the fateful sixth inning.

    Palos got a strike out to start the sixth, but then the roof caved in. Dan Pierce blooped a single to shallow left-center. Brett Umstead ripped a solid single to left and George Kochu beat out a swinging-bunt single to load the bases. Brandon Sullivan singled to deep short to tie the game at 1-1. With the Bulls' infield still drawn in, Martin hit a grounder to short that may have been a force at the plate or may have been a double-play. But after the ball took a wicked hop off the shoulder of Ernst and into shallow right-center, Umstead and Kochu had scored and it was 3-1 Owls. Ryan Zakszeski was then hit on an 0-2 pitch to reload the bases and Jon Kalejta got plunked on the very next pitch to make it 4-1 Owls.

    Exit Palos. Enter Steve Geisel.

    Betz ripped Geisel's first offering to left for a two-run single and this thrilling, nail-biter of a game was turning into a rout as it was 6-1 Gabelsville. Gary Hessler singled to plate Kalejta and it was 7-1 Owls. A.J. Bohn walked to reload the bases and then Jordan Force was plunked to make it 8-1. Sullivan then got his second RBI single of the inning to make it 9-1 as Gabelsville sent 15 batters to the plate in the sixth inning.

    "I don't know how long [the sixth inning] took, but it seemed like a couple of hours," said Limeport manager Pat Lane.

    Limeport would get RBI singles from Ziegenfuss and Cudwadie in the bottom of the seventh to close out the scoring, but the 9-3 defeat left the Bulls one game from elimination as the Owls took a 2-0 series lead.

    "We were up a run going into the sixth inning in both games," said Lane. "But once again we should have had a few more runs. You can only make so many mistakes against [Gabelsville]. You cannot depend on one-run leads holding up. Palos came out and threw great for five innings. I can't say enough about his effort on short rest."

    And if the Owls refuse to adopt the number 6 as their lucky number, then they can certainly turn 6 upside down and make 9 their lucky number because that is the number worn by Shawn Betz, who is perhaps their true lucky charm.

    With Betz on the team, the Owls have won 6 titles in his first 10 years in the league and the Owls are one win away from 7 rings in 11 seasons. This would be the second 3-peat for Betz if the Owls can get one more win in this series. And the important thing to remember is that Gabelsville did not win a title from 2002 through 2004, the 3 seasons that Betz had moved out of the area and was not on the team.

    Betz, a veteran warrior, has a career 56-13 record in regular season games as a pitcher for the Owls. If you think that is impressive, he also has a 16-3 record in postseason games since 1999 (when the league started tracking postseason statistics). Betz may have another 4 or 5 postseason wins from 1997-98, his first two years in the league.

    "He's been a good pitcher in this league for a lot of years," said Lane. "He knows how to change speeds and he locates the ball wherever he wants to."

    "[Betz] threw well and kept [Limeport] off balance," said Danner. "He threw all of his pitches for strikes."

    The Bulls will try to stave off elimination at Gabelsville in Game 3 at 5:45 this Friday. Scott Bolasky of the Bulls and Justin Konnick of the Owls are the Game 3 probables.

    Josh Martin was 3-for-4 with 2 RBI, Brandon Sullivan was 3-for-4 with 2 RBI and Gary Hessler was 2-for-4 for Gabelsville (29-7). Mike Cudwadie was 2-for-4, Ben Swatsky was    2-for-3 and Devon Ziegenfuss was 2-for-3 for Limeport (23-14).